My own blog, reviewing the books I have recently read, either purchased or kindly sent to me to review. All books I have received are marked as such in the blog. I am NOT Sarah Broadhurst who works for The Bookseller and Lovereading. My other review blog is http://sarah-sarahreviews.blogspot.com/

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Wednesday, 9 July 2014

Today I am pleased to welcome Bernie Su and Kate Rorick to my blog, following the publication of their new novel, The Secret Diary of Lizzie Bennett, last week.

This book is based on the you-tube series of videos of a similar name. The book has the plot of a modern day Pride and Prejudice - it has the same basic plot however it I do not believe that it had the same effect on me that the classic has everytime I read it. The book is a series of diary entries and explains about why the youtube clips came about and also the effect that these clips have on family and friends.

I enjoyed the modernisation and the diary entries are peppered with modern day references, including recent songs, films and equipment. I do like the idea of classics being revisited and modern references being peppered throughout the adaptation - when I was in high school I went to see a performance of Romeo and Juliet which was set in the modern day and it really made me a fan of this style of adaptation.

In summary I would say this book will be enjoyed by the target audience of young teens but as a modern day pride and prejudice it didn't really work for me.

As part of the blog tour I am pleased to welcome Bernie Su and Kate Rorick, the authors, to my blog and to talk to them about the novel, how they feel that they have modernised the story and the tools and social media they have been able to use to bring it right into the 21st century.

A Conversation
with Bernie Su and Kate Rorick

Why did you decide
to write a novel?

Kate: We knew
fairly early on that our version of Lizzie Bennet was pretty special and had a
really interesting worldview. While Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice is a timeless character, she is reacting to
circumstances very much from her own time period – marriage being the only
option for women, entailed estates, etc. In modernizing Lizzie, we found that
her story on the videos also translated well to book form – after all, we still
read. Plus, there were so many things that we only talked about on the videos
and didn’t get to experience, due to the limitations of the video format. In a
book, there are no such limitations. We could be with Lizzie at the Gibson wedding,
walking around San Francisco, or simply enduring her mother’s histrionics about
her single daughters. The book let us fill out the world in a way that the web
videos – and their meager budget – didn’t allow us to do.

Because the storyline already existed, what was your
writing process like? Was it difficult to coordinate the story with the videos?
Were you surprised at any difficulties or opportunities along the way?

Kate: The
first thing I did when figuring out how to write this book was to create a
really big, really detailed calendar of events. Where Lizzie was, when her
videos posted, the movements of all the other characters, what party fell on
what date and what happened there, who tweeted what when…it’s an enormous and
scary-looking colour-coded document. It was incredibly important that the book
fit within everything we had already established. Even though I knew the story
very well from having worked on the show, I found myself referring to the
calendar time and again as I tried to navigate where character moments should
go. On the one hand, it forced me to conform. On the other, it forced me to get
creative.

This timeless
story works well in our modern times, with a few minor adjustments. What from
the original story was the most difficult to contemporize?

Bernie: We
wanted to modernize the independent woman. Back in the 1800s there weren’t a
lot of options in careers, and it was important to us that career choices be an
underlying current to every major decision that our characters make. We didn’t
want it to be about finding the guy/marrying the rich guy.

Kate: One
specific stumbling block I remember coming across when we were writing the
series was the time it takes for information to get from one place to another.
In Pride and Prejudice, if you needed to tell someone something, you had to
write a letter, and at least a week would pass before it reached its
destination. Now, everything can be found out at once, thanks to smartphones.

The Lizzie Bennet
Diaries uses social media to give all of the characters a voice. How do you
think this adds to the viewer’s experience of the story?

Bernie: The
social media expansions add three unique experiences to our interpretation of
this story:

1. When the show was running, you (as a viewer) could talk
to the characters and they could talk back to you. You could be a part of their
stories.

2. You could explore more about the characters through
their social media destinations; for example, Jane’s Pinterest gives you a lot
of insight into what she’s going through during her arc.

3. You could experience the story from another
character’s point of view. What was Lydia doing when Lizzie and Jane are at
Netherfield? What was Georgiana Darcy going through before she finally meets
Lizzie? We have that for you; it exists for you to discover and explore.

Discuss your
decision to make the book analogous to the videos, rather than an omnisciently
narrated book like Pride and Prejudice.

Kate: While Pride and Prejudice is in third person,
it sticks pretty strongly to Elizabeth’s POV. There are only a couple of scenes
that aren’t told from her perspective. As she discovers new information, the
audience discovers it as well. If Jane Austen were writing today, I wouldn’t be
surprised if she tried a first-person narrative. Lizzie’s voice is so strong in
the videos, carrying it over to the book was simply common sense. This is her
story. She has to be the one to tell it.

How is the process
of writing a work like this, one integrated into so many platforms, different
from the usual TV episode or novel?

Kate: From my
perspective, it meant we had a lot more data to work with. (Hence, the big
calendar.) Every tweet sent, every photo posted on Pinterest, every comment on
the videos had to be treated like canon. It can be mind-boggling trying to keep
everything straight and to navigate a story between it all.

Bernie: It
definitely goes both ways. If you write that a character says they’re going to
have lunch with someone, there’s an obligation to acknowledge and verify that
event through social media. We have to be hyper-aware of everything the
characters are doing at any given time.

What did you learn
from this experience that may help you in similar endeavours in the future?

Kate:
Personally, I learned that when you tell a good story, it can be told many
different ways. And instead of competing, they can complement one another.

Bernie: I
learned to embrace alternate points of view. It goes back to the adage that
everyone is the hero of their own story, even the antagonists. Yes, characters
need to serve plot points, but why are they there – what are they really like
as people?

Do you have any
plans to expand The Lizzie Bennet Diaries any further in other media? If not,
would you like to?

Bernie: This
story is timeless and has been told across so many platforms, but with all the
multi-platform content that we do, I would love to try to make an app.

What’s next for Lizzie,
Lydia, Jane, Darcy, and Bing?

Kate: What’s
next in terms of their stories? Well, perhaps you’ll get to find out in the
near-ish future…

Thank you to the publishers, Simon and Schuster Children's Books, for sending me the book to review and to the authors for joining me on my blog to be part of the blogtour.

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About Me

A mum of two children and a wife. I am an activity worker in a Children's Centre, currently run by the city council. I have recently completed a Foundation Degree and am continuing studying through Open University for a degree in Early Years Studies. My other hobbies include cross stitching, where I have model stitched for a number of designers, and also papercrafting, making mainly greetings cards.